Who Are you Hanging Out With?

The Clinton camp and the media dismiss Bernie Sanders at their own peril

I’m not alone in saying that I’ve pretty much had it with corporate media; I had to Google for five minutes this morning to find out how Bernie Sanders did in Idaho and Utah, because the headlines the mainstream media trumpeted was of Clinton’s stupendous win in Arizona. Of course, they also called Arizona for Clinton at about the same time the polls closed, leaving voters standing in mile-long lines wondering what the hell game was being played. We all wondered – and, in fact, still do. As noted on BestPoliticalMeltdowns.com, somebody had to take the fall for the colossal balls-up in Arizona voting – but worry not, because Michele Reagan, the Arizona Secretary of State, admits that what happened in Arizona was “awful” and has promised to do better:

What happened to Maricopa County voters yesterday was awful. I can honestly say that as of right now we have no explanation why county election officials decided to reduce the number of polling places down to only 60 locations. While each individual county makes their own decisions, I need to make sure yesterday’s polling place upheaval doesn’t happen at our next statewide election on May 17th. Or worse, the presidential general election in November when thousands more new voters will be casting ballots for the first time.

You know, I have two words for Arizona politicos and Ms. Reagan: Bite me. Fact is, Arizona screwed up badly, reducing polling places from 200 to 60, “accidentally” having some registered Dems listed as Independents. No conspiracy theorist, here, but Reagan needs to figure out what they’re going to do about yesterday’s primary – like, you know, declare the results void, re-count, whatever it takes. At this writing, the Arizona legislature is said to be holding a special legislative session on this fiasco on Monday, March 28th. We can only hope that it’s less about finger-pointing and more about fixing – even re-doing – the “awful” events of March 23rd.

But I digress. Clinton won Arizona, sure. She wins big in red states; after all, water does seek its own level. But Bernie Sanders buried Clinton in Utah and Idaho, and I’m not talking about just a little trickle of dirt on her head, but a full-on 6-foot deep burial (in Utah, Sanders won with 79.3% to Clinton’s 20.3%, and in Idaho, Sanders swept with 78% to Clinton’s 21.2%). The pledged delegate math is tricky, but it’s there. And if you go even further, and pretend that the super delegates haven’t already been bought and sold by the Clinton camp (even in states she’s lost), well, that’s another story altogether. And yet, we’ve got progressive sell-out Markos Moulitsas querying on The Hill whether it’s “game over” for Sanders (after declaring on the Daily Kos that March 15th would be the drop-dead date for anti-Clinton posts); we’ve got Philip Bump at The Fix mocking Sanders supporters, and, for someone so dismissive, spending an inordinate amount of time declaring, by the numbers, why Bernie’s campaign is over (and in the process, demonstrating how “The Fix” is in for Clinton); and we’ve got every mainstream media outlet on the planet praising Clinton’s Arizona win, while downplaying Bernie Sanders’ Clinton-crucifying wins in Idaho and Utah (and, of course, forgetting to cover the mega-rallies Bernie’s holding in the upcoming primary states).

Bernie told the Young Turks in a live interview that the corporate media’s “conflict of interest” has hurt his campaign:

The media is an arm of the ruling class of this country and they want to talk about everything in the world except the most important issues. Because if you talk about real issues and people get educated on the real issues, you know what happens next, they might actually want to bring about change.

No one can deny that the media blackout and the pro-Clinton bias has hurt his campaign – and yet, he’s still winning. He’s still out-fundraising the powerfully-connected Clinton. He’s still bringing larger crowds to his rallies than Clinton. His victories in Utah and Idaho demonstrate that he can, in fact, win upcoming primaries by that magic 60% number to start to catch up to Clinton’s delegate lead. But make no mistake: If he keeps the momentum going, and the media continues to black him out, and super delegates stubbornly continue to cling to Clinton’s coattails, and Congressional Dems continue to urge him to either drop out or stop bagging on Clinton because it may hurt her in the general election (can you believe the audacity?!?), and the DNC keeps slanting the playing field in Clinton’s favor, and President Obama keeps quietly stumping for Clinton and undermining Sanders, and so-called progressive websites declare a moratorium on anything smacking of anti-Clinton, well, then, these establishment folks are going to get the revolution they never wanted or supported in the first place – and it won’t be pretty. Bernie or Bust isn’t a game or a ploy or a strategy or anything of the sort; it’s a movement, and it’s not going away. Brogan Morris at Salon described it better than just about anyone has:

It’s not just a disaffected few making a stand either; these ‘Bernie or Busters’ don’t constitute a mere handful of the senator’s many devotees. In November, a reported 33% of Bernie Sanders supporters won’t give Hillary Clinton their vote if she wins the Democratic bid. That’s a sizable chunk of Dem voters – over 41% of them so far – saying it’s either Bernie Sanders for President, or nobody at all . . . It’s a bold statement, especially as the alternative to the Democratic candidate in the general is now almost certain to be Donald Trump, aka the sexist, immigrant-bashing serial liar and current sixth-greatest threat to the global economy. Predictably, some havebeencritical of the Bernie or Bust movement. By refusing to stump for HRC on Election Day, they say 33% of Sanders supporters increase the risk of Trump’s America . . . To the Bernie or Busters, half-measures no longer cut it. It’s why they’re for Sanders in the first place. And if their protest means letting a sub-Mussolini demagogue slip into power, so be it . . . The idea now is not to support the best candidate, then, but to thwart the worst one. It’s cynical, it’s disheartening, it’s the dreaded politics as usual. And after months spent hoping things might finally change under their guy, 33% of Bernie Sanders supporters have, quite simply, had enough of playing the old games.

” Bernie or Bust! ” That’s the defiant rallying cry of the Bernie Sanders hardcore, the pledge made by Sanders supporters that intend to vote for him and him alone in the general election – whether his name’s on the ballot or not.

I think I spent a very long time writing an article that could have been summed up by two words near the top. You guys don’t like our support for Bernie Sanders and think we should vote for Clinton because you say so? Bite me.